Female monster stole more than half a billion dong from her neighbor to 'run' errands

From the complaints…

In mid-2018, the Investigation Police Department of Nam Dan District Police received a series of complaints about fraudulent appropriation of property through applying to the Military Medical Academy and studying abroad. It is worth mentioning that all the victims who wrote the complaints were neighbors of the scammer.
Immediately after receiving the complaint, the District Police quickly proceeded to check and verify the content of the complaint, took the victim's statement and collected relevant information and documents. During the initial investigation, based on the collected documents and evidence, Nam Dan District Police determined that the above-mentioned property fraud ring was led by Ho Thi Thu Ha. In fact, Ha is a person without a stable job, with the talent of "talking in the wind", the subject has defrauded the neighbors around her. There are even victims who have been defrauded up to 3 times.
In early July 2018, the Investigation Police Department of Nam Dan District Police initiated a case and prosecuted Ho Thi Thu Ha (born in 1988), residing in Lam Son block, Nam Dan town, Nam Dan district, for the crime of Fraudulent appropriation of property.
However, during the investigation of the case, although the District Police had summoned and questioned her many times to verify the relevant information, the suspect Ho Thi Thu Ha had fled the area. The Nam Dan District Police proactively coordinated with the Police of other local units to contact the provinces, cities, towns, and locations where Ho Thi Thu Ha was suspected of hiding to verify and track down her whereabouts.

In addition, the district police force also regularly sent officers to the subject's house to persuade the family to provide a hiding address if the subject Ha contacted them. Thanks to the persistent implementation of synchronous measures, after a period of focused monitoring and understanding the situation, the Nam Dan district police have obtained information that a subject suspected to be Ho Thi Thu Ha is present around District 5, Ho Chi Minh City.
As soon as the news was reported, a working group set off to Ho Chi Minh City to verify the subject Ho Thi Thu Ha. After nearly a week of continuous surveillance, at the end of June 2018, when it was confirmed that it was Ho Thi Thu Ha, the detectives swooped in to arrest her. Because she was caught by surprise, she could not escape in time, so the working group transferred the subject to the Nam Dan District Police Headquarters.
At the police station, in front of the victim's report and the collected evidence and documents, Ho Thi Thu Ha had to bow her head and admit her crime. After committing the crime and realizing that she would be denounced, Ha quickly fled to Ho Chi Minh City to hide in order to avoid being arrested and prosecuted, but unexpectedly was discovered and arrested quickly by the Nam Dan District Police.

Revealing the "job running" trick

At the police investigation agency, Ho Thi Thu Ha confessed that because they were neighbors, she knew and took advantage of the fact that Ms. Vo Thi S. (born in 1971) and Ms. Van Thi Th. (born in 1964), both residing in Nam Dan town, were looking for opportunities for their children to study in universities and study abroad, so Ha came up with a scam to appropriate property for personal use.
Around November 2015, when visiting her sick father-in-law, Ha happened to meet Ms. Vo Thi S. Through the conversation, she learned that Ms. S.'s daughter had just finished school but had no job yet, so Ha "bragged" that she had the possibility of applying to join the Army. Ha said the total price was 265 million VND, but she had to deposit 60 million VND in advance. Anxious about her daughter's job after graduation, Ms. S. brought 60 million VND to deposit for Ha.
To make Mrs. S. more confident, Ha received the money and wrote a commitment in Mrs. S.'s notebook promising to return the entire amount if she could not find a job after 9 months. Not only that, Ha also typed the content, got signatures from the internet, photocopied, and edited the Decision on female soldiers joining the army after studying of the Military Region 4 Command with the name of Mrs. S.'s daughter going to school, making Mrs. S. not have the slightest doubt.

After that, Ha took the money to Vinh City to meet a woman named Van (unknown background and address) to ask for "admission" to the Military Medical College, but this woman said that to get in here, it would cost 800 million VND. Knowing that he did not have enough money to "admit" the job for Mrs. S's daughter, Ha refused to pay the 60 million VND deposit and took it home for personal use.
When the "running" into the Army was not yet done, in March 2016, Ha continued to sweet talk and whisper to Mrs. S. that the "running" into the Army was "stuck" and that if she studied abroad in Australia, she would have a higher salary.
So, Mrs. S. listened to Ha and sent her daughter to study abroad in Australia with 500 million VND, depositing 66 million VND in advance for Ha to "finance" her daughter's study abroad, and the remaining amount would be paid before boarding the plane.
About 3 months later, through the internet, Ha met an Australian man and had the idea to continue to trick Mrs. S. into making documents for her daughter to study abroad for free, with a full scholarship of 250 million VND and Mrs. S. continued to agree. After that, with many similar tricks, Ha continued to ask Mrs. S. to send money to apply for a work visa and a student visa to Australia. However, when the deadline came and her daughter still did not have a job, Mrs. S. demanded the deposit back.
To prolong the time, Ha continued to think of new scams. In January 2016, through the internet, Ha learned that a petroleum company was recruiting workers in Nghe An, so she introduced him to Hoang Van D. (born in 1993), Ms. S.'s son, to steal 55 million VND. After promising to help Ms. S.'s son, Ha failed, so she continued to trick Ms. S. into getting her son into the Army (gunsmithing) for 250 million VND. Because she was so eager for her son to have a job, Ms. S. was caught up in the "job-seeking" cycle that Ha had drawn up and could not escape.
Like the previous times, Mrs. S. continued to deposit 60 million VND but still did not see her son accepted into the payroll. When coming to the house to claim the money back, Ha cleverly and sweetly "steered" Mrs. S. to send her son to work abroad in Australia with the purpose of extending the payment time and appropriating more assets. Not stopping there, in a similar manner, Ha also accepted to run procedures for working abroad, run interviews for Mrs. S.'s son and appropriated 84 million VND. The total amount of money Ha appropriated from Mrs. S. was 557 million VND.
Using the same trick, Ha also defrauded Ms. Van Thi Th., Ha's neighbor, to get 2 scholarships to study in Australia for her daughter for the amount of 60 million VND. In this case, the investigation agency also discovered that Nguyen Song Thao (Director of Nhat Minh Thinh International Study Abroad Joint Stock Company) used a similar trick to take advantage of Ho Thi Thu Ha to appropriate 242 million VND from Ms. Vo Thi S. in 2016.

Moments of regret

In early May 2019, the People's Court of Nghe An province opened a first-instance criminal trial of two defendants, Ho Thi Thu Ha (born in 1988), residing in Nam Dan town, Nam Dan district, and Nguyen Song Thao (born in 1982), from Yen Thanh district, Nghe An province (living in Cam Le district, Da Nang city) for the crime of "Fraudulent appropriation of property".
Early in the morning, Ho Thi Thu Ha was escorted to court by police officers. Unlike her talkative appearance when "running errands", Ho Thi Thu Ha sat quietly, looking down at her handcuffed hands. When she saw her ex-husband leading their two young children into the court, Ha burst into tears. It is known that Ha and her husband have divorced, and the two children are currently living with their father. Although it was time for the trial, the panel of judges had to temporarily stop the trial for a short time so that the defendant Ho Thi Thu Ha could calm down. After the defendant calmed down, the trial began.

At the trial, the two defendants confessed and admitted to all their crimes. Defendant Ho Thi Thu Ha explained her crime by saying that due to her difficult family circumstances (she is an orphan and is currently divorced), she lacked money to spend, so she "came up with such a scam". Defendant Nguyen Song Thao said that because the company was losing money and was in debt, she took a "risky" approach to get money to pay off the debt.
During the debate, a victim stated: “Defendant Ha was aware that he was incapable of running errands and had no connections with “this or that person”, but he still committed fraud many times and against many people. It can be affirmed that the defendant intentionally committed the crime. Therefore, I request the court to handle it strictly, according to the provisions of the law.”
The jury determined that the fraudulent appropriation of property by the defendants Ho Thi Thu Ha and Nguyen Song Thao was a dangerous act for society, an act of property appropriation. However, the victims were also partly at fault for trusting and repeatedly giving money to the defendants. During the deliberation, Ha looked around frantically for her children and caught the eyes of her ex-husband. Ha lowered her head, silently sad. The call of her two young children calling for their mother made Ha cry. Just because of laziness and greed for money, Ha had fallen deeper into the path of crime, and now it was too late to regret.
Considering the case as a whole, considering the aggravating and mitigating circumstances, the Trial Panel sentenced Ho Thi Thu Ha to 12 years in prison and Nguyen Song Thao to 6 years in prison for the crime of “Fraudulent appropriation of property”. Nguyen Song Thao is currently serving a 10-year prison sentence for the same crime, so the total sentence Thao must serve is 16 years in prison. In terms of civil matters, the defendants are required to return all the money they have appropriated to the victims.
At this trial, the Trial Panel also recommended that recruitment for work at companies, agencies, especially State agencies, must have a recruitment quota to submit documents, go through the selection rounds, and selection according to current regulations. In addition, studying abroad or exporting labor must go through reputable companies to prepare documents, procedures, and mandatory tests, not through individuals. This is a warning lesson for many others to avoid being scammed and having their property stolen by bad guys.